Thursday, August 28, 2014

Below are the words of saints shared in love and humility. I share them
with you now not in legalism, but in the Spirit of Christ as food for
thought in a time when the deception of the enemy of our souls grows
daily more subtle and powerful leading up to the great deception that
precedes the return of our Lord. I pray these various thoughts from
other brothers and sisters will be a blessing.-sermondindex.net

"As you sit down to watch TV, count the minutes. How long until you hear
the first swear word, how long before the first sexual joke, how long
until a violent act takes place, or how long until a child shows clear
disrespect to a parent? Probably not too long! Start watching for these
things, and you will be amazed. Analyze the humor in a show. Often it
centers on foul language, sexuality, or disrespect or rebellion, and the
limit is always being pushed."

- Karl Graustein

"As
we think about consistency, let me just emphasize the whole area of
entertainment, and the kind of entertainment that you approve for
yourself and for your children.

You as a mom (and dads as well)
are responsible to make sure that your children are being protected.
Particularly as younger children; before they know how to discern right
from wrong, you’re responsible to help them make those choices.

Entertainment
is an area today where we are so influenced in subtle ways by a culture
that is contrary to God’s ways. It’s more subtle because we laugh at
entertainment; we’re amused by entertainment. It’s fun, so we don’t
think of how dangerous some of what we’re being exposed to might be in
its philosophy, in its behavior, in what it’s promoting as a worldview."

- Nancy Leigh DeMoss

"Statistics show that the
average child living at home in America watches at least twenty-eight
hours of television each week. (For some kids, the total is much
higher.) Programming that targets young people is often the very worst
at deliberately glamorizing sin. By the time most young people graduate
from high school, they have been overexposed to the grossest kinds of
evil through 'entertainment' media in mind-numbing ways—so that nothing
seems particularly appalling anymore. After all, drug use, immorality,
violence, and profanity are standard fare on television. When a whole
generation has been raised on a steady diet of that stuff, it's no
wonder that sin no longer seems exceedingly sinful to them."

- John MacArthur

"When
we sit in front of sights, images and messages that are the opposite of
God’s Kingdom, we allow our minds to be subtly manipulated by the
voices of darkness, whether we realize it or not....

But it’s not
just movies and T.V. that has us in its controlling vice. It’s an
overall pre-occupation with pop-culture. Music artists, professional
athletes, and movie stars claim far more of our applause and attention
than Jesus Christ does...

Idols are not just golden statues that
people bow down to in ornate temples. An idol is anything that claims
our attention and affection above Christ. Most of us verbally declare
that Jesus Christ is more important to us than our fetish for music or
movies. But what does our life say? Where do we spend the best hours of
our day? What do we turn to for enjoyment and comfort?

Tauler wrote, A pure heart is one to which all that is not of God is strange and jarring.

Pop-culture
floods our minds and senses with things that are not of God. But for
most of us, the glamorized sin that surrounds us is not strange and
jarring. It’s normal and accepted. In fact, we go out of our way to
enjoy and participate in it. We even spend a huge amount of our time and
money on it. And we allow it to capture our mind, emotion, and
attention. Christ makes it clear that we cannot love both Him and the
things that charm and ravish this world. We cannot be dazzled by the
images of pop-culture and captivated by the King of all kings:

"Do
not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the
world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the
world - the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of
life, is not of the Father but is of the world." (I John 2:15-16 NKJV)

"Adulterers
and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is
enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world
makes himself an enemy of God." (James 4:4)

...Does God stand up
and cheer over American Idol? Does He smile with delight over the new
Twilight movie? Does He get excited about the latest Cold Play album? Or
does He grieve over our distracted, wandering, divided hearts?"

- Leslie Ludy

"Today,
there is a whole generation... laughing at things that ought to make
them weep, and not a few of them will suffer shipwreck, and some—the
loss of their souls. Let the indiscriminate viewer beware."

- R. Kent Hughes

"Do
nothing unworthy of Him who represents you in heaven, and whom you
represent on earth. He is faithful to you; be you so to Him. Let men
know what a Lord and Master you serve. Be His witnesses; be His mirrors;
be His living epistles. Let Him speak through you to the world. Let
your life tell your fellow-men what He is, and what He is to you. Speak
well of Him to men, as He speaks well of you to God. He has honoured you
by giving you His name; He has blessed you by conferring on you
sonship, and royalty, and an eternal heritage: see that you do justice
to His love, and magnify His greatness. . .Be true to Him who loved you,
and washed you from your sins in His own blood."

I hope all are doing well. I've been under the weather and that's okay. God is here, He speaks to our hearts in these times, He loves us so!

Let us not be deceived, we are seeing more and more blogs that are totally omitting the Father. I'm wondering if they are worried about offending, or about numbers on their blogs? Oh dear me! In this time of troubles let's be that Blessed Hope for others. Let us not forget our precious Jesus. Remember Lot's wife...The love of the world...and all that goes with that. ...Nothingness.(photo by Robert Stock)

Let's remember Lot's Wife and not ever forget about our precious Jesus. You can have all this world...just give me Jesus. This song sure puts things in perspective...Please be blessed!

Monday, August 11, 2014

Recently our daughter, Marianna and I were at the grocery in smalltown. Who does Marianna spy but a WWII vet! We spot these heroes by their hats many times... I see her over there listening to this precious man and his sweet wife...I scoot on over...This man was sooooo precious. This gracious man tells of the battles he fought and how the people back home areheroes to him for their sacrifices.
This is the kind of thing that makes me proud. It makes me proud for what our country was and what I hope for it to be again. This country had a healthy fear of God during those WWII years from what I see and study. God bless our present vets as well, how they must feel at times.

It makes me proud that our daughters caught the most important lessons in homeschooling; to respect and honor those who fought for us; it goes along with loving others as ourselves, being kind, being grateful and thankful. Christ-like.

These are our heroes. These are the ones my girls would get autographs from when they were little in their little handmade booklets made by sweet little hands of red construction paper with artfully placed patriotic stickers on the covers, titles carefully printed in crayon and marker by those wee hands on those covers. So many times the look on these elderly gentleman's faces when approached by our little girls were that of quiet surprise for they have felt forgotten.

This precious man wept openly, tears streaming down his face as he tells us he saw a battleship blown up with fellow soldiers in it...He tells us how he'll never forget. He looks at our faces with stoic blue eyes and tells us many American bones are on foreign soil.

This precious man is 91 years old and doing wonderfully as well as his lovely wife. They raised nine children together without hand-out and his wife tells me that now-a-days people can't even raise one. Yes ma'am.

Marianna tells me just now as I show her these photos taken:

"They are all leaving us now...We have to be themnow..."

We have to be them now.... Yes ma'am.

Closing now from the Forest Cathedral this most poignant August afternoon...

Thinking of my dad who this gentleman at the store so reminded me of... This is my mom and dad circa...around 1954. Yes ma'am. My dad is now 84 years young along with my mom.

My mom and dad 1954.

P.S. A taped segment of the late Louis Zamperini was on Haven of Rest radio broadcast today, part II will be tomorrow. Check him out, another one of our great heroes. Books have been written on him, he is a follower of Christ and has an amazing testimony at every angle. Mr. Zamperini just went to be with the Lord July 2, at the age of 97. Our family started listening to the best selling book about him, "Unbroken" on tape, truly amazing. EDIT: Do be aware that there are several places in the book that may not be appropriate for young children or youth.

About Me

Hi, I'm a middle-aged veteran home educator. I live in the forest. I sew, write, create, cook, and take care of our fur angels. ...I'm also a hopeless romantic who wishes it were the 40s again. Follower of Christ. An ethical vegetarian. I laugh hard and pray hard too! : )